Industrial and power generation turbomachines include a casing that houses a turbine. The turbine includes a plurality of rotor blades, or buckets, positioned along a gas flow path through the turbine, the blades supported by a number of turbine rotor wheels. The rotor blades and wheels define a plurality of turbine stages. Turbomachines also include one or more combustors that generate hot gases. The hot gasses may pass through a transition piece toward the plurality of turbine stages. In addition to hot gases from the one or more combustors, gases at a lower temperature flow from a compressor toward a wheelspace of the turbine. The lower temperature gases provide cooling for the rotor wheels as well as other internal components of the turbine. In order to prevent hot gases from entering the wheelspace, the turbine includes near flow path seals arranged between adjacent rotor wheels or rotor blades. The near flow path seals may be configured to fit closely adjacent the rotor wheels or rotor blades to reduce the leakage of hot gasses from the gas path into the wheelspace.
Generally, each of the rotor blades for a given stage in the turbine are attached to the respective rotor wheel using a dovetail assembly—i.e., the base of the rotor blade has a shape that is complementary to a slot in the rotor wheel—allowing the dovetail end of the rotor blade to slide into the dovetail slot in the rotor wheel and be held in position during operation of the turbine. Additionally, in certain turbines the near flow path seals may be attached at their base to rotor wheels using a similar dovetail assembly. Such a construction can ensure proper alignment of the rotor blades and near flow path seals during operation of the turbomachine. However, once all of the near flow path seals are installed for a given seal member rotor, the base of the seals may not easily be accessible. Such a construction may create some difficulty when, for example, a maintenance worker needs to remove one or more of the near flow path seals. More particularly, with such a construction, a first near flow path seal may need to be damaged in order to remove it and gain access to the base of the adjacent near flow path seals.
Accordingly, a tool that could assist in removing one or more near flow path seals would be beneficial. Moreover, a tool that could assist in removing one or more near flow path seals while minimizing any damage thereto would be particularly useful.